Friday of the Second Week of Lent – March 5, 2010
Matthew 21:33 – 46
"Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect his fruit.
"The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. 'They will respect my son,' he said.
"But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, 'This is the heir. Come, let's kill him and take his inheritance.' So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
"Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?"
"He will bring those wretches to a wretched end," they replied, "and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time."
Jesus said to them, "Have you never read in the Scriptures:
" 'The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes'?
"Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but anyone on whom it falls will be crushed."
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus' parables, they knew he was talking about them. They looked for a way to arrest him, but they were afraid of the crowd because the people held that he was a prophet.
God has no interest in forcing a kingdom of Love and Transformation on people. The very act of forcing Love and Transformation on another would violate the essence of love and transformation. So God is patient, waiting long for persons to wake up to the reality of this alternative kingdom, sending all sorts of messengers and servants to announce the kingdom and to collect the fruit of the kingdom.
But we humans are fickle. Rarely do we allow that there could be another plan larger than our own. Infrequently do we admit that we are not masters of our own universe. We are a people who take charge, who have grown accustomed to our own way of working in the vineyard, and we will not be supplanted, even by God.
The parable is a testament to human stubbornness, to the human will that is set up for itself and against the larger and greater good for which God works.
It would be easy to get lost in the details of the parable, to be overcome by questions about the words and images. We might do well not to get immersed too deeply in those questions, but rather allow the obstinance and stiff-necked will of the parable’s tenants to remind us of our own resistances.
Within each of us there are pockets of resistance to God, parts of our lives that stand back from allowing ourselves too much intimacy with God. In the faith tradition of my upbringing, if you got too cozy with God, you would end up in Africa as a missionary. For some folks that was a good thing. For me and many others, it was frightening and helped keep us from a deeper intimacy with God.
Perhaps today you would notice ways you resist God. In the language of the parable, notice the “tenant” within you. When you hear certain sermons, you feel your insides tighten. When you read certain passages of Scripture, you quickly move to another. When you sense God might be leading you to a particular course of action, your get anxious.
For our spiritual health and well-being, it’s worth examining those places of resistance within us. If we’ll brave that difficult terrain, we’ll know our own inscape more thoroughly and be more capable of offering all of ourselves to God in love.
"Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it and built a watchtower. Then he rented the vineyard to some farmers and moved to another place. When the harvest time approached, he sent his servants to the tenants to collect his fruit.
"The tenants seized his servants; they beat one, killed another, and stoned a third. Then he sent other servants to them, more than the first time, and the tenants treated them the same way. Last of all, he sent his son to them. 'They will respect my son,' he said.
"But when the tenants saw the son, they said to each other, 'This is the heir. Come, let's kill him and take his inheritance.' So they took him and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
"Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those tenants?"
"He will bring those wretches to a wretched end," they replied, "and he will rent the vineyard to other tenants, who will give him his share of the crop at harvest time."
Jesus said to them, "Have you never read in the Scriptures:
" 'The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes'?
"Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people who will produce its fruit. Anyone who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces, but anyone on whom it falls will be crushed."
When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard Jesus' parables, they knew he was talking about them. They looked for a way to arrest him, but they were afraid of the crowd because the people held that he was a prophet.
God has no interest in forcing a kingdom of Love and Transformation on people. The very act of forcing Love and Transformation on another would violate the essence of love and transformation. So God is patient, waiting long for persons to wake up to the reality of this alternative kingdom, sending all sorts of messengers and servants to announce the kingdom and to collect the fruit of the kingdom.
But we humans are fickle. Rarely do we allow that there could be another plan larger than our own. Infrequently do we admit that we are not masters of our own universe. We are a people who take charge, who have grown accustomed to our own way of working in the vineyard, and we will not be supplanted, even by God.
The parable is a testament to human stubbornness, to the human will that is set up for itself and against the larger and greater good for which God works.
It would be easy to get lost in the details of the parable, to be overcome by questions about the words and images. We might do well not to get immersed too deeply in those questions, but rather allow the obstinance and stiff-necked will of the parable’s tenants to remind us of our own resistances.
Within each of us there are pockets of resistance to God, parts of our lives that stand back from allowing ourselves too much intimacy with God. In the faith tradition of my upbringing, if you got too cozy with God, you would end up in Africa as a missionary. For some folks that was a good thing. For me and many others, it was frightening and helped keep us from a deeper intimacy with God.
Perhaps today you would notice ways you resist God. In the language of the parable, notice the “tenant” within you. When you hear certain sermons, you feel your insides tighten. When you read certain passages of Scripture, you quickly move to another. When you sense God might be leading you to a particular course of action, your get anxious.
For our spiritual health and well-being, it’s worth examining those places of resistance within us. If we’ll brave that difficult terrain, we’ll know our own inscape more thoroughly and be more capable of offering all of ourselves to God in love.
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